edwinbcn: Both The Owl Pen by Kenneth McNeill Wells and Here is New York by E. B. White describe living on a farm in the countryside, with nostalgia for the old ways of living that were still around in the 1920s - 1950s, but came under pressure later in the century.

A wonderful picture of a vibrant city from a time before McWalbucks destroyed the cultural and civic landscape of America. I loved the description of the man leaving his apartment in the morning and making multiple stops for errands before work, all within one or two blocks of his home, and then again on his way home in the evening, picking up re-soled shoes etc - neighborly visits to individually owned stores run by specialists with only one vocational focus - what a quaint idea; perhaps it will catch on.

One of the best things about the book is that E B White anticipates the coming decline and does not shy away from reporting it. Quite sadly his metaphor of planes over New York threatening the populace has a darker overtone in our time but that, and White's ability to see beyond the facade, made the book extremely relevant. Even if (and perhaps because, given his prescience) so much of the landscape he describes has changed beyond recognition since he wrote his piece. ( )

E.B. White paints the perfect picture of New York City. Akin to Kerouac did describing the Beat Community in the 1950's in On the Road, I felt the nostalgia for times I was never a part of. There was a quiet wistfulness in his prose. There was one paragraph where White talks about New York's destructibility that was prophetic, creepily so.

I loved it. My only complaint was the length. It was far too short. It only contributes to dream like quality. ( )

E.B. White paints the perfect picture of New York City. Akin to Kerouac did describing the Beat Community in the 1950's in On the Road, I felt the nostalgia for times I was never a part of. There was a quiet wistfulness in his prose. There was one paragraph where White talks about New York's destructibility that was prophetic, creepily so.

I loved it. My only complaint was the length. It was far too short. It only contributes to dream like quality. ( )

E.B. White paints the perfect picture of New York City. Akin to Kerouac did describing the Beat Community in the 1950's in On the Road, I felt the nostalgia for times I was never a part of. There was a quiet wistfulness in his prose. There was one paragraph where White talks about New York's destructibility that was prophetic, creepily so.

I loved it. My only complaint was the length. It was far too short. It only contributes to dream like quality. ( )

Wikipedia in English

"On any person who desires such queer prizes, New York will bestow the gift of loneliness and the gift of privacy." So begins E.B. White's classic meditation on that noisiest, most public of American cities. Written during the summer of 1948, well after the author and editor had taken up permanent residence in Maine, Here Is New York is a fond glance back at the city of his youth, when White was one of the "young worshipful beginners" who give New York its passionate character. It's also a tribute to the sheer implausibility of the place--the tangled infrastructure, the teeming humanity, the dearth of air and light. Much has changed since White wrote this essay, yet in a city "both changeless and changing" there are things here that will doubtless ring equally true 100 years from now. To wit, "New Yorkers temperamentally do not crave comfort and convenience--if they did they would live elsewhere."

Anyone who's ever cherished his essays--or even Charlotte's Web--knows that White is the most elegant of all possible stylists. There's not a sentence here that does not make itself felt right down to the reader's very bones. What would the author make of Giuliani's New York? Or of Times Square, Disney-style? It's hard to say for sure. But not even Planet Hollywood could ruin White's abiding sense of wonder: "The city is like poetry: it compresses all life ... into a small island and adds music and the accompaniment of internal engines." This lovely new edition marks the 100th anniversary of E.B. White's birth--cause for celebration indeed. --Mary Park